Getting Your Site Seen By Search Engines
|
Is your website listed on search engines? When people search for you, does your site show up on page 1 or page 20 of the search engine results?
Optimizing your site to get it ranked highly on the search engines can be a complicated subject. To simplify things, it's helpful to first understand how search engines add sites to their database. Then we'll cover some tips that you can put on your own website that will help you to get listed on search engines and get a higher ranking.
The Major Players
Let's start off with the major search engines, the ones that most people use. Google is the most widely used search engine with Yahoo and MSN searches following close behind. While there are thousands of search engines, it's always a good idea to start with submitting your website to the three largest. Why? Because 95% of all searches go through either Google, Yahoo or MSN.
Who Is Powered by Whom?
Many search engines do not have their own database, but rely instead upon data supplied by someone else. This is important to know so that you can submit your site to the most popular search engine databases first. For example, AOL Search and Yahoo Search get data from Google, while MSN and HotBot get some data from Inktomi.
How Search Engines Read Your Site
There are two ways search engines read your site: automated (crawlers) and human-entered (directories). Crawlers follow the links found on your site and enter your site into their search database based on text they find on your pages. This text is either found on your public pages, or the text keywords found in behind-the-scenes "meta tags". The amount of your keywords found on your page, the more weight it has with the search engines and the higher your ranking. But in case you think you can load your page with keywords in order to fool the search engine, think again. Search engines are smart and you can be penalized for "spamming" keywords on your website. Major crawlers include Google, AltaVista and Inktomi.
Human Directories are few and far between. Just imagine hiring enough people to research the millions of website on the Internet! It's no wonder they're steadily being replaced by automated crawlers. Yahoo is one of the most famous human directories, where real people actually evaluate your site and categorize it in their database directory. More and more these search engines are relying on partial automation for categorizing and listing new sites in the search engine database. In addition, getting your listing in a Directory for free can take months. Some human directories are charging a fee for business sites to be included in their directory.
How Search Engines Index and Rank Your Site
Search engines use several techniques to determine which category your site belongs in and what keywords or key phrases people will use to find your site when using the search engine.
When submitting your site to search engines, they will ask you four things: the title of your site, a short description of your site, your keywords or key phrases (what words or phrases people typically use to search for sites like yours) and what category your site belongs in. Then they will often crawl your site, checking to see if the keywords/key phrases you supplied match the text on your website. And remember, you will be penalized for spamming your keywords and rank LOWER because of it. Also it's important to note that search engines can not read the text in graphics, so if you are using a graphic-based navigation or have your keywords on a graphic next to your logo, the search engine will not notice it.
Some search engines will rank your site based on your title, description and keywords that are supplied behind-the-scenes in special coding called "meta tags." While not every search engine will read meta tags, it certainly can't hurt to use them. Again, there are rules: your Title meta tag can't be more than 100 characters, your Description meta tag can't be more than 250 characters, and your Keyword meta tag can't be more than 1,000 characters. And anti-spamming of keywords applies to meta tags as well ? no more than six instances of the same word in your Keyword meta tag or you'll be penalized by the search engine. For example, if my key phrases include "business coach," "starting a business," and "small business coach," that counts as two uses of the word "coach" and three uses of the word "business".
Submitting Your Site to Search Engines
Once your site is primed and ready for the search engines, then you have to submit it to them. You have two choices: either go to each search engine and submit your site individually, or use a search engine submission tool. Remember that the majority of searchers use either Google, Yahoo or MSN, so consider submitting to those first. You'll often find a link on their main page where you can add a site to their search engine. If you want to automate the process, use an automated submission tool. Make sure the submission search tool you select will analyze your site to tell you if you're really ready to submit, then submit your site to the top search engines for you.
Preparing your site for submission to search engines can feel like a daunting task. With these tips in mind, you'll save yourself a lot of time and frustration when it comes time to submitting your site and rank higher in search results.
See you on the Internet!
About The Author
Karyn Greenstreet is a Small Business Coach and Self Employment Expert with 23 years of self-employment and computer industry experience. She shares tips, techniques and strategies with self-employed people to create and grow their businesses, stay focused and motivated, and perform at their peak. Visit her website at www.PassionForBusiness.com
|
|
|
Maximize Your Search Engine Traffic - 13 Ways To Pull In More Visitors From The Search Engines
Maximizing traffic from the search engines to your web site is not a difficult task but it does require you to think ahead and plan your Search engine optimization strategy carefully. If you have not yet built your web site and are still in the initial planning stages then you may have an easier time of it. If you already have an existing web site, then you may need to take the time to read up on these SEO strategies and make some changes to incorporate them into your web site.I will discuss 13 ways in which you can improve on your existing web ...(related: Seo)
4 Tricks For Lightning Fast Indexing
The biggest problem that most are running into seems to do with getting INTO the search engines. Rankings aside, you need to first get them to index you. Here are the four main ways to assure yourself fast indexing:Indexing Tip #1:Never launch a new site with a lot of back links. Build natural links over weeks and months.Let's face it, there is no guaranteed method of getting indexed by Google fast, and buying links from high-ranking sites does not guarantees anything either.The most immediate red flag you should watch out for is your number of incoming links. According to Google, it takes time to get ...(related: Seo)
Top Ten Listing? Hmmmmmmmm
This is my question...I spend a fortune on SEO and now I am #1. If there are 976,840 businesses like mine on the internet, why is that I am # 1?Am I the only one who cares about being #1? Are 970,000 other business owners stupid? Are they all so poor they can't afford to bid? Am I really #1? Why is it that the next 3 listings just below mine are not the sites of my competitors but listing for directories? Is it really possible that I am the only one who understan...(related: Seo)
How Do I Submit My Site To Search Engines?
You've built up a good site, put in a lot of content, but none of the search engines lists your site? If you'd like to know how to go ahead with Search Engine Submission the right way, read on.How do I get my site to be included in search-engines? That's a question a lot of people ask me. My question back to them is "Is your Site Search-engine ready?". A lot of sites don't get spidered into search engine results just because the pages are not search-engine friendly. Search engines like to see a lot of text on your site. This means that if your site is filled with Flash an...(related: Seo)
Google Rank Cake
6 cups thick content mix1 jar word of mouth, whipped2 tablespoons meta tags1 cup creativity1) In a bowl, stir content mix with 1 cup creativity. Stir. If hard, let sit overnight2) Stir in meta tags.3) Heat server to 100 degrees. In a 1024x768 pan...(related: Seo)
Google Ranking Without Ever Submitting To Google!
A while back, I read an article that explained how to get a good google rating without ever submitting your site to their submission forms. Like you, I was kind of shocked by this statement so I decided to give it a try.In the beginning, I used to submit my site all the time to Google but soon realized the magnitude of my failure. Of course, it's a known fact that Google relies solely on your link popularity and content.Link Popularity?What that means is the amount of links (yousite.com) listed on other sites that are related to yours! The more sites that link to you, the greater your popularity!So again, Google ...(related: Seo)
Seo Expert Guide - Paid Site Promotion (marketing) (part 7/10)
In parts 1 - 6 you learnt how to develop your proposition, identify your key words and optimize and promote (for free) your site and pages. You were also introduced to our mythical Doug (who ...(related: Seo)
10 Ways To Make Sure Your Seo Goes Out Of Its Way For You
If they want to have success, companies should do everything they can to ensure that their SEO firm doesn't provide lousy service. Here are 10 tips to keep in mind:1. Be realistic.Don't waste your time or the SEO firm's expertise by arguing about broad search terms. Don't say you want to be in the Top 10 for "e-commerce." The SEO firm should ask: "E-commerce and what else? E-commerce consultants? Please be specific."2. Think long-term.If you can't help you...(related: Seo)
Quick Keyword Research That Works!!!
Keywords are terms or words related to particular topic. Keyword research involves various aspects, for example; to find sales oriented keywords or to drive maximum qualified users to increase the online sales.Sound keyword research is the first step toward successful search engine optimisation campaign. We have to be careful while selecting keywords. It is tricky to select target keywords for a website. Keyword selection should be always based on various aspects like...(related: Seo)
Understanding Google - What You Need To Know To Conquer This Search Engine Giant
Use a keyword density of about 1 to 2%. Use to be that you could rank high with 5% to 15%, but not any more. Google will call that "over optimizing" and penalize you.Don't use more than 83 characters (including spaces) in your meta title tag. That usually comes out to about 10 to 15 words. If you have more characters, there is no penality it's just that Google won't count them as being in your title tag.Your important keywords absolutely MUST be in your title. (That is if you want them to achieve any importance at all.)Google doesn't use the description tag for a description like some search engines do, but take the time to write a good description of your site anyway. Google does index the words in the description tag just like they were words in the text. Be sure to use keywords in your descri...(related: Seo)
site-map - Copyright © 2006 | You can send your articles and get links. Contact Webmaster | All Rights Reserved.
| Seo